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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (April 5, 1907)
huii tm.fi iiu m,. ii 6 The Commoner, VOLUME 7, NUMBER 13 6N.T GOPICS ' . L ' 7 " 1 j. ' iLA. ,,1 , Jlf r f- 7T"Triiini iffrrftTijg Q PEAKING of $:12,000,000 Cionli'lbiilloiiH to Iho kj "cause of education" an Associated Press dispatch under (Into of Cleveland, Ohio, March '2V,, is interesting: The Standard Oil company today advanced all grades of gasoline, naphtha and rellned oil In barrels one-quarter cent n gal lon, free on hoard, at Cleveland. It 1h Hinted by Standard oMIoIuIh that the advance at this time 1h made necessary by the constantly Increasing cost of cooperage and the material used In manu facturing barrels. It Is declared that the com pany Is experiencing the greatest dIMlculty In se curing Umber tt the right kind to supply Its coop erage plants. No advance in prices Is made on gasoline or refined oil sold from tank wagon." CiAN It be possible that the staid old "Public i Lodger of Philadelphia is after all not In fallible? In a recent Issue the Public Ledger printed a letter under these headlines: A IIOMMSIOK I3X1LM Forgotten Grave in Tunis of Payne, the Author of "Home, Sweet Home." The letter follows: "I think it Is not generally known that Colonel John Howard Payne, who wrote the words of the song 'Home, Sweet Home,' died in Tunis, Africa, and that his remains now be in a small English cemetery in that city, far away from 'Home, Sweet Home.' Payne was born in Now York in 1702, and died 54 years ago. Carroll 8. Tyson, of Philadelphia, in a letter recording the above facts, adds (after a recent visit to Tu nis) that 'John Howard Payne must have boon actually and truly a homesick cxIloA He was American consul at the time of his deAth. Does It not seem pitiful that one avIio so pined for 'Home, Sweet Home,' without a.vall, Uiould be burled in a neglected grave In a foreign land? "WIIMElt ATKINSON. "Athens, Greece, March 8, 1007." The remains of John Howard Payne were re moved from Tunis, and In 188IJ Interred in Oak Hill cemetery, near Washington, D. C. This was done at the expense of the late W. W. Corcoran, the Washington City philanthropist. JOHN ELLMOHE, a shoemaker living at Al toona, Pa., has discovered a secret which, in the opinion of well informed men, will bo worth millions of dollars to him and of great ser vice to the world. By Mr. IDlhnore's discovery six parts of ashes mixed with one part of co:il and treated with a compound produces heat liercer than the best bituminous and under this arrangement one ton of coal may be made to Jo the work now done by four. ACCORDING to a special report issued by the census bureau, a synopsis of which Is given by the Washington correspondent for the Houston, Texas, Post, the total estimated value of tho na tional wealth In 11)01 was $107,101,102,410. The Post correspondent says: "This represents an in crease in the four years' period from 1000 to 100-1 of $18,5SO,8S5,o:k. This advance in national wealth has no parallel In the history of the United States except the decade from 1850 to 18(50. In 3850, when tho first estimates of the .national wealth were made, the tlgures were only $7,i:5, 780,228. Tho most potent cause for tho increase in the nation's wealth from 1000 to 1004, It Is stated was the reaction from tho low prices of the period of depression from 180(5 to 1000. The annual in crease of tho wealth per family from 1000 to 10IU was $1S2. The total public indebtedness of con tinental United States in 1002 was .$2,7S0,000 V0 and tho total per capita Indebtedness was San.no" 'I ho total indebtedness of the national government for the same year was $025,01 1,0:17, and per capita indehtedness was $11.27. The Indebtedness of tho United States government Is its gross indebted ness less capital In the treasury. In i)02 the an nual Interest charge on the public debt of conti nental United States Is shown to have been an- orMn,V.lVly 1Ilnr1(!'n. aniuuil payment 01 l,u lor each individual, in Gr.eat Iirltiiln M10 per capita indebtedness of all. Classes, .national and local, was :.!):$ times that of the United State in France 4.8(5 and in Italy ian. Tho assess. valuation of property subject 4ad valorem tav ation has increased from 1850 0 pesent time, but it lias not kept pace with tho Increase jn the actual national wealth. The total assessed val uation of property In 1002 was 35,tf8,31C,833, while In 1800 it was only $25,473,1 7;j,418. The es timated true value of all property in 1002 was $07,810,740,500, against $05,037,001,108 in 1S00. The total levies of ad valorem taxes in 1002 was $724,730,50, and the tax rate per $100 of esti mated true value was 74 cents." O SOME idea of tho way the people of Pennsyl vania have suffered under machine rule may be obtained from tills statement made by the Philadelphia Public Ledger: "As the investigation into the building of the $13,000,000 state capitol proceeds It Is apparent that State Treasurer Ber ry's charges and accusations instead of being ex aggerations, wore really mild and subdued as char acterizations of the actual facts. It appears from the mere surface scratchlngs of the legislative committee's inquiry that the job has all the marks of tho regular larcenous contract business with which the people of Philadelphia have been fa miliar since the day when the organization got complete control of the city and state. It is be lieved that of the $13,000,000 expended, at least two or three, and possibly live or six, millions of dollars were stolen or thrown away. If one such contract results In so great an exhibition of cor ruption and recklessness, what would happen to the state and to its people if into the hands of the politicians there should be delivered continu ing operations involving billions of money and the prosperity of the inhabitants? It is possible to forsce only chaos, corruption and a total dis trust of the government." o AN INTERNATIONAL TRUST has, according to the New York World, secured control of the Bible and Axes the price of the precious book like tho price of oil or sugar is fixed. Tho Ameri can Bible society, founded ninety-one years ago, is the American branch of tho combination; The other members of tho pooling agreement are the British and foreign Bible society, and the National Bible society of Scotland. A movement is now on foot in New England to bring about an investi gation by congress of this Bible trust. At the same time congress is to bo asked to remove the twenty-live per cent tariff duty on imported Bi bles, and a general attack is to be made against this great octopus. - O S TEARING of the Bible trust Rev. Edmond P. Merriam, editor of the Watchman, ttie organ of the Baptist denomination in Now Eng land, said: "I have written as strongly as I have because of tho two points, which are evident to . any one who reads the annual report of the American Bible society: First, the price of Bi bles has been raised to a rate higher than inde pendent booksellers charge; and, second, the fne gifts of Bibles during last year by tho society amount to only $10,400 in the United States and foreign lands, while the administration expenses exclusive of the item, 'Diffusion ' of Information $7,000,' mounts up to over $30,000. Every dol lar's worth of free Bibles distributed by the Amer ican Bible society cost nearly $4 to circulate The salaries of three secretaries and a treasurer who compromise the executive ollicers, are $0 000 a year. Clerks find assistants take $10,021 'mor. We used to buy a testament in Canada which cost us laid down in Boston, a little less than three cents, and which we sold at that price. Since the trust was formed Wo cannot get these, and a similar book put out by the American Bible so ciety costs live cents. We can buy more cheaply from independent publishers than from the Amer ican Bible society since the recent increase In l)ll(l?' whIS,is liy wrotc ou tue editorial page ot tho Watchman recently: 'The undisputed facts are these: Tho British and foreign society has 111 agreement with tho American Bible society flint it will not sell Bibles for distribution In l America nor will tho American Bible society sell Bibles for distribution in England. The Canadian BlbS society will not sell Bibles for gratuitous distri bution in the United States. Tho American Bit le society has also been carrying on a nrona-andn by which local Bible societies have beoinducc to become auxiliary to tho central society and to send their funds there, and the Bible colportace work which was formerly one of the chief activi ties of the society and which deservedly won to It n,1,?ii2SP?ft ofCul,,?t,nn People, has been almost entirely discontinued. Although heavily endowed the American Bible society does not sell Bibles any cheaper than they are made and sold by in- ' Sndc PUWMicrs. The administration exV nouses of the society are enormous and it does not i,?SVy ?. uluoul,t o benevolent work as would ',i J 1 Ji ,exl)0,1es' T"o writer has long stu- m In i 7 ik 0f-, the AmGric Bible society at ! " .afbfoatl nd has believed for several jciis that it is not an organization to which the could hpti?i5i f ?l'1SthUl I,e0pl for Bib,G could be judiciously committed.' " O TN THE CURRENT annual report of the Ameri- nnC-au ?. lG society tbe b0,lr(1 of managers' say: During the year (WOO) four new Bible societies have been recognized as auxiliaries of the Na tional society. Thirty-two societies have been nnrhd,n thG ,ist of ,Ilv,"S und acti auxiliaries During the same period three societies, formerly auxiliary, hrtve been removed from our list. This action became necessary because those societies Silg.nf,-CenKevl1 , JUn,uln those close and heln ful relations to the National society which the name auxiliary implies. The total number of lo cal Bible societies' sharing our burdens and rec ognized as our auxiliaries is 541." rplIE WORLD adds: "It is charged by the of X cers of the Union Bible society that instead of aid Ins In the circulation of the scriptures in the United States, the absorption of a local society as an 'auxiliary' merely makes it a co S ector $ funds for the American Bible society, which for twenty-live years previous to the issuance of i last annual rep,t, had abandoned 'Louseio-boustf work among white Americans. The constitution ?fneyery 'auxiliary' must cojitain thS ! nrtick? All funds not wanted for circulating the scrip tures within the societys own limits shall be nail over annually to the parent society.' Local Bible' societies, of which there were 2,200 in this coun try a few years ago, all do house-to-house work Lu li (list;'iet maintaining paid agents, who sell Bibles where they can and give them away fam lies too poor to purchase them. But if a local society does not consent to become an 'aux iliary' it pays an additional 10 per cent more fm. its Bibles than if it buys f rom tiie Tme ?can -ble society. Since tho Bible trust began to ab sorb local societies under threat of dropping them from its list of lavored customers-those anoVcd to purchase at costnearly 1,000 of these societies have been driven out of exigence. This n meant the abandonment of that number of fields of house-to-house work. The American Bible so ciety for many years prior to 190G did no col portage -work except a little among the negroi in the south, among the Indians and in foreign fields Of scriptures printed and purchased las" year the annual report of the society shows thS including Bibles, testaments and portloS ttoJ were printed at the Bible House 1,020,055 pieces and printed abroad 1,320,011 pieces, while nearly 50,000 more were purchased abroad. Of tills vnS output a little more than one-third was distributed ecelvfo"1 Si??, T itS r O 2 leceiven tor all of tills output ovponf fm. m o DR. J. W. THOMPSON, of Cheshire M-iss who is president of the Union Bible society says that the agents of his organization have hopn systematically persecuted by the American nihiS society since the Union society retted to beSrn an auxiliary to the Bible trus t. Dr Siompson says that the methods of the Bible trust do mit SrInSedNv ToS 'V - mdard OH uusr. uie rsew ork World says: '"Name the amount in cash you will take to bring about dlsbandment of this society wn , Si ritl.m made to one 7t&lfnZ SSSTS 1. iuuen, who is a director in Uvn hnni-o .-.' r.i.s.TtK0' th Xsjk ?vul rtP G ,lai;"est corporations in Worcester 'Hie offer was declined. The -American Bible .t, .